book editor, bibliophile + word nerd
Courtesy of Hatchette Worse Things Happen at Sea by Australian actor William McInnes and his wife, filmmaker and animator Sarah Watts, is a wonderful celebration of Australian life, families, relationships, parenting, renovating and much more. Each chapter, written by either William or Sarah, takes an intimate look at a stage or event in their lives that has ...
Always a great introduction to new authors, this short story collection is part of Get Reading!, Australia’s largest annual celebration of reading and books. There are some fabulous Australian authors included in the book; some established, some newbies. The book programme is an Australian Government initiative aimed at promoting books and reading amongst all Australians. It ...
Alan Carter has done it; he has managed to win me over as someone who can count the number of crime novels she has read on one hand. I was intrigued, excited, scared witless and grossed out; but couldn’t put it down. No wonder Prime Cut was the winner of the 16th annual Australian Ned Kelly ...
If a genie suddenly appeared in my life and granted me one wish (and I couldn’t choose world peace or the demolition of poverty) then my wish would be to write like Tim Winton. What a master he is! I picked up this slim memoir for $1.00 at a school fair recently and it will go ...
Courtesy of Pan Macmillan Joan London’s Gilgamesh is set not far from where I grew up in the south-west of Western Australia so I am a little bias when I say I loved this book. It is the 1930s and the world is living on the edge. World War ll is imminent. It traces the ...
Caleb’s Crossing by Australian-born Pulitzer Prize-winning author Geraldine Brooks is the amazing story of the first Native American Indian to graduate from Harvard University in 1665. Caleb Cheeshahteaumuck hails from Brooks’ current stomping ground, Martha’s Vineyard off the coast of Massachusetts. It was the fact that Caleb graduated in the 1660s and not the 1960s at ...
Courtesy of Allen & Unwin In March, Australian stand-up comedian and actor Anh Do was announced the winner of the Indie Book of the Year 2011 for his memoir The Happiest Refugee. Each year Australia's independent booksellers vote on the award and 2011 is the first time that a work of non-fiction has won. It is the ...
Western Australian author Liz Byrski’s new novel Last Chance Café looks at growing old in a new light. We are a society obsessed with staying young and beautiful and rarely does literature tackle the right to grow old and enjoy the process. A round of applause for Byrski. The book is filled with some wonderful characters and ...
It is the process that went into the writing of this book that first attracted me to reading it—Australian sisters Kris Webb and Kathy Wilson write under the pen name of Kathy Webb. The fact that they live in different parts of the world and have to contend with different time zones and young families doesn’t ...
Families can be dysfunctional and messy, especially when it comes to spending the holiday season together. Life in Seven Mistakes by Susan Johnson is a satirical look at what happens to three generations of the Barton family when they get together over a ten-day period to celebrate Christmas and the golden wedding anniversary of ...
The Rip by Robert Drewe is a beautiful collection of short stories set on the coast of Australia that looks at lives and relationships and how they can change in an instant through unexpected and sometimes dramatic events. There are thirteen stories in The Rip and at the centre is the ocean, soothing and comforting, ...
South African born Australian citizen JM Coetzee is a Nobel Laureate and a multi-award winning author who is well loved in Australia. I have read some of his fiction before so was looking forward to Elizabeth Costello, the story of a distinguished Australian writer who travels the world delivering a series of lectures. Unfortunately for the first ...
I am an Australian freelance editor, proofreader and blogger with extensive experience working with books, magazines, newspapers, websites, social media and academic journals.
